12 Common Mistakes that Hurt SEO

As a web designer, it is important to look at those features that will affect the user experience, functionalities and navigational issues. The reason being that these features have a great impact on the ranking of your website.

Here we will give you some cues as what design mistakes you should avoid so that it does not affect your SEO strategy and you get better ranking in any search related results.

1). The quality of the content

Never lose sight of the fact that however, beautifully decorated your website is, it would matter not much if the content posted there is not up to the mark.

If a visitor finds your content's good, then not only will he stay there longer to look for more but also come back for newer contents. Besides, such a person will also tell his group of friends about your website and your goodwill will grow through the word of mouth.

If you are posting an article make sure that it is at least 700 words (more will be better). You can also use some good quality pictures with it.

If you make a hash of selecting the wrong keyword then all your effort to boost the ranking of a website will go down the drain.

While it looks very easy to find the most important keywords through tools like Googles AdWords, there are several subtle nuances which if followed correctly will help your website a great deal with increased traffic.

First of all, you have to understand what the visitor that you want to target is looking for? And when you deduce it, then need to select a keyword that is not only relatable to it but is also popular.

3). Do not post duplicate content on your website

If you have posted a content on one of the pages of your website, then it is important that you do not post it anywhere else. Because if you do that, then it will be counted as duplicate content.

Search engine algorithms are very efficient in sniffing out duplicate content. If they find any such contents on your website, then it will be considered as adopting Black hat techniques.

Any application of Blackhat techniques is deeply frowned upon by the webmasters. If they see a hint of any such technique on your website, then they will penalize your website and will not rank it.

4). Stuffing your website with keywords

While using the keywords strategically is an effective technique that all SEO experts do, keyword stuffing is one thing that should be avoided at all cost.

Keyword stuffing is using similar phrases or words to target your viewers in a way that your content’s quality comes down.

This technique is not encouraged by the search engine algorithms and if they find out that you are using it then they will consider it as a Blackhat technique and penalize your website.

5). Not focusing on the meta-descriptors and title tags

Title tags and meta description are one of the many SEO techniques that when implemented correctly not only improves the traffic to your website but also improves your ranking.

These two taken together tells your visitor what he will expect on the website when he clicks on it. If you use nice and catchy title tags with appropriate keywords, then it has a great chance of attracting the targeted audience.

6). Adding irrelevant internal linking will affect your ranking

While providing links both internal and external is very helpful from the SEO perspective, do not use them unnecessarily.

Only provide links to those subjects that are relevant to the content that you have posted on your website otherwise it will affect the quality adversely.

7). Not putting engaging contents in your website

While posting long articles is a good technique to get some extra credit from the search engine algorithms, make it a point that the articles that you are posting are engaging.

When you post engaging content, then the visitor is more interested in staying a bit longer to read the entire article and then come back for more.

This improves the traffic to your website which results in better ranking from the webmaster.

8). Not focusing on the speed of your website

It is important that your website loads fast otherwise the viewer will simply move to some other website.

There are several reasons why a website is slow to load, including slower connection or a huge amount of resources on the website that the browser has to process.

Make sure that you so not put a large number of high-resolution images and that that there are no unnecessary animations and videos that will make it harder for the site to load quickly.

9). Not using the data analytics to identify a problem

If your website is not attracting traffic, then it is possible that you are doing something wrong.To identify if there is any problem related to your website, it is essential that you take the help of data analytics.

Once you have identified the problem then you will be able to solve it. While there are a large number of paid analytic programs that will help you diagnose the problem, you can make use of Google Analytics also. It is free and very powerful.

10). Not focusing on the subheadings of your contents

When the Google algorithm goes through your website, then besides the title, it also looks at the subheadings carefully to deduce what the content is all about.

It is therefore important to use keywords in the subheadings for better ranking.

11). Using cheap website hosting

While cost is a factor, but do not use this criterion as your sole focus while choosing the right web hosting site.

If you choose a cheap and low-quality web hosting site then it will affect your goodwill through slow speed and downtime issues.

12). Not taking care of the broken links

It is a recurring problem as the site with which you have provided links may have shut down or changed its domain.

It is therefore important to regularly keep checking the links provided on your website and change or removing any broken links otherwise the visitor will think that you are not professional.

About the author

A writer, an Entrepreneur. Curious about the internet of everything. Interested in the cutting edge landscape of mobile apps, SaaS products and latest technology trends. Founder & CEO at Guru Technolabs